Nic Rhodes, Student Government Association vice president, will present a plan to remove the plus/minus grade system.
The plus/minus system allows professors to add a plus or minus to students’ grades, effecting their GPA.
OCU adopted a plus/minus grading scale in the ‘90s for the purpose of professor autonomy and grade differentiation. Rhodes ran for office with a platform that supported the system’s removal.
Without the plus/minus system, a 90 percent grade and a 100 percent grade are both an A and worth the same GPA, but an 89 percent is a B. With the plus/minus system, an 89 is a B-plus which lessens the effect on the GPA. On the other hand a 92 is an A-minus which lowers the GPA from a 4.0.
The estimated 0.2 GPA subtraction makes enough of a difference, Rhodes said.
“The current system might benefit C or D students, but it takes away from high-achieving students, since there’s no A-plus,” he said. “The University of Oklahoma and Oklahoma State University don’t run on plus/minus systems, so if students from each university had 92 percent in a class, the OCU student would have the only GPA less than 4.0. We compete against these universities for jobs, so we should be evaluated the same.”
Rhodes said he plans to meet with faculty this week to develop and distribute a survey to the campus community. The survey, sent via email, will ask students what they know about the plus/minus system, if they are in favor of the switch, which students they think it will benefit or disadvantage, and if they currently receive more minus or plus grades.
A separate survey will ask faculty if they typically give more pluses or minuses to students, as well as if they think changing the system will benefit students, if it will erase differentiation between grades, and if they are in favor of the change.
One student agrees with Rhodes that the system needs change.
“My classes are already difficult to the point that grade distribution is pretty even,” said Arrash Allahyar, cell and molecular biology junior. “As a prospective med school student, my GPA is very important. At OU or OSU, my GPA would be a 4.0.”
Another student disagrees and wants to keep the current system.
“With my major, I am in favor of the plus/minus system,” said Emily Watson, nursing junior. “I have to make certain grades in order to pass my classes, and the plus/minus system is how they determine that.”
The survey results will determine if SGA continues to push for changes to the system.
Rhodes said, if the survey results favor removal of the plus/minus system, students would need to band together to push university officials to change the system. The soonest the university could make the change is Fall 2016
Any change to the grading system would require the approval of the Faculty Senate.
“There wasn’t much time for this first semester, but we’re gauging student and faculty interest now,” Rhodes said. “We’re in the research stage. We’ll find out people’s reactions and go from there.”
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